


In the Depths of Insanity

by minimalistdreamer



Series: Percabeth Angst [3]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Annabeth Chase, BAMF Percy Jackson, Dark Percy, F/M, House of Hades, House of Hades Au, Major character death - Freeform, Not Beta Read, Post-Tartarus (Percy Jackson), Post-The Blood of Olympus (Heroes of Olympus), Post-The House of Hades (Heroes of Olympus), Super angsty, We Die Like Men, extremely sad, warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-24
Updated: 2020-06-24
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:01:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24885751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minimalistdreamer/pseuds/minimalistdreamer
Summary: In a fit of strength, Percy was able to pull up Annabeth while she was dangling over the edge, her feet reaching down into Tarturas. However, Percy then slipped, falling alone into the darkness.Answering the question: What if Percy fell into Tartuaras alone?
Relationships: Annabeth Chase/Percy Jackson
Series: Percabeth Angst [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1800757
Comments: 32
Kudos: 355





	In the Depths of Insanity

**Author's Note:**

> I got this idea from @sophi3_wa1t3r, and posted about it on Tumblr. Now, though, I'm writing it. I started crying while writing, so this is a warning. It's really sad and angsty.

_"Your memory is a monster. It summons with will of its own. You think you have a memory, but it has you."_

_-_ John Irvins

* * *

It was so sudden, so quick, that Annabeth didn't even have time to call out before her chin hit the stone.

Her feet were dangling over the edge, the web that was wrapped around her foot pulling her into the abyss. It was if as if the darkness itself was creeping forward, slowly consuming Annabeth as she hung on. 

Percy was holding her hand, keeping her tethered to the sunlight, to him. But he was grunting and his forehead was beaded with sweat. 

"Percy," she breathed. "It's okay." Tears dotted her eyes. Her fingers were slipping, falling away from his. 

_Sacrifices, beautiful sacrifices._ The voice from the pit mused. Annabeth felt like crying, tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. She didn’t think she would die like this, she had been so _happy_ when Percy had appeared above her. Was that only moments ago? It felt like hours.

Seconds felt like minutes as if her mind knew that her life was ending soon and was trying to make it last as long as possible. 

"No!" Percy said, his voice raw. "No!" 

Annabeth desperately wanted to assure him that it’s okay. That everything will be okay. But the words got caught in her throat, blocking her ability to breathe as well as speak. 

With a cry and a final bout of strength, Percy swung her up and over the edge, the web on her ankle-breaking. But the momentum made him slip, the stone cracking under him. 

Annabeth felt her body hit the ground and her throat cleared. She was alive and safe. But when a strangled cry came from behind her, she knew something was wrong. 

Percy fell before Annabeth could even move. His figure disappeared in the darkness. It wasn’t like how the darkness pulled her, slow and painfully. His fall was quick, only with a flash of a tanned hand reaching up before he disappeared from her view. It was as if he was never there. 

The sound that Annabeth made was inhumane, it came out of the deep crevices of her gut, bursting out of her chest. 

"Percy!" She screamed, falling to her knees. Her hands grasped the edge that she was just dangling off of. Kneeling in the same place that Percy just was. He wasn't even there long enough to warm the stone, it as cold and inhumane as it was when she was laying on the ground, thinking of how to trick Arachne. But now, Arachne was in the pit, with Percy. 

She screamed so loud that her voice left her, so loud that Percy must have heard it, no matter how deep in the earth he was. She could only imagine the fear that must be racing through his veins. 

Annabeth was restrained before she could jump in herself. Every single one of the other demigods had to pull her, still kicking and scratching and trying to get back to where Percy had just fallen. 

"He'll die!" She cried. "He'll die!" 

She had to go back, she had to go and save him. She had to go and tell him that she was sorry and that she loved him. 

* * *

_We’re together._ Percy had said. Oh, how Annabeth wished that to be true. 

Annabeth stood at the railing of the ship. Was it only that morning when she and Percy went around Rome? 

Her fingernails have been bitten to the buds, now digging into the wood so hard that blood smeared when she moved. 

The Athena Parthenos was supposed to protect them. 

What bullshit.

Piper appeared a little while later, holding a mug of hot chocolate. 

“Here,” she said. Her voice was soft as if Annabeth was sleeping and one loud noise could wake her. That made Annabeth want to scream at her, to tell her to stop with the pitying looks and soft voices.

She wanted noise. She wanted people to make a joke and everyone to laugh. She wanted to pretend that Percy was still there. That if she didn’t turn around, he would be there - laughing. That if she didn’t turn around, he’d be fighting a monster or smiling with that _stupid_ crooked grin. 

When Annabeth did nothing but stare at her with an ugly frown, Piper left the hot chocolate on the railing next to her. On top of the smeared blood.

The last time she drank hot chocolate, it had been in New Rome. 

It felt like dust was rolling atop her tongue, so she spit it out, and for good measure, chucked the mug overboard too. 

It splashed and fell under the waves. Another pang hit her as she was reminded of Charleston. Of when she threw her dagger into the harbor and Percy appeared as if he’d been summoned.

Annabeth stared at the rolling waves for another hour before she knew for certain that Percy wasn’t going to appear. 

* * *

The days continued in silence. Whenever Annabeth left her room, she was met with empty smiles and pitied gazes. Nico told her regularly that he felt Percy's life force, but with it came the same unsaid warning. 

_Don't get your hopes up,_ they were all saying. _He may not survive._

She knew he was lying. She had overheard him whispering to Hazel about they needed to keep her hopes up so she’d be more likely to help

The only thing he hasn’t lied about was Percy was one of the most powerful demigods, and if anyone could make it - it was him. He said it carefully, thinking that if said too fast - Annabeth would suddenly break down. 

Annabeth did break down, she cried all that night from the comfort of her room. The next morning, everyone saw the eyebags that hung from her eyes, dragging them down. 

The team slowly fell apart. Annabeth was the glue that had dried up. She just didn’t find the strength to give a fuck. She did her work quietly and efficiently, no one dared defy her.

* * *

When they finally did arrive at the House of Hades, Annabeth was forced to wait until Hazel could clear up the passage. 

So she fought, and holy gods, she fought with everything she had. She clawed, she bit, she fought with every bit of anger that had been building up inside her since the pit grabbed a hold of Percy and pulled him down. 

When the battle was done, she was tired and bleeding. Her arm was definitely broken and she had to limp to the others. But, when she caught sight of Percy - all her energy was repaired.

He was bleeding and bruised, dirt-covered him from head to toe. A groan escaped him every few moments, and she didn’t like the wheezing that accompanied it. But she just waited for him to wake, pushing his hair away from his face. When he opened his eyes, Annabeth felt her breath catch in her throat. 

She was only able to see her own broken reflection in his gaze, his eyes darkening from seafoam to a hurricane. But when he whispered: "Annabeth?" in a scratchy voice and smiled, a weight lifted off her chest. _There_ he was, there was her Seaweed Brain. 

She had sobbed and he had too. But that was okay because he was okay. Everything was okay.

They were together. 

* * *

When they got back to the ship and things started returning back to how it was before, Annabeth noticed little things that began to pile up. 

Whenever Percy struck down a monster, watching it crumble to dust, his eyes were a little too bright, smile a little too gleeful. His anger reigned unchecked. Sewage water ran through the hallways constantly. If he was alone, more often than not, his eyes would flash and the others would scramble to leave. 

When Annabeth was with him, she would touch him slowly, like water lapping his skin. First a few fingers, then a palm, then after a moment - a hug. Percy would unravel slowly and carefully only when he knew that Annabeth was there to catch him. 

Every friendship that he had formed slowly crumbled, his anger overtaking everything else. But sometimes, he would crack a joke and the broken pieces of her heart would start to be pieced back together. 

But Annabeth still prayed to the gods for him to be okay, to get better. Because her Percy was still there, in between the fits of madness, he was there. He made jokes and smiled in his lopsided smile and would wrap her up in his arms like he never wanted to let her go. 

* * *

It wasn't until a few days later that Annabeth realized that Percy wasn't okay, and may never be again. 

A flock of harpies had appeared on one of the nights that Percy was patrolling. He had insisted that he was better and needed some normalcy back in his life. 

When Annabeth had walked upon the deck that early morning, she was met with the convulsing bodies on the harpies, slowly crumbling to dust. Percy was standing above them, just watching and listening to their anguished cries. It was like a broken piece of the wood railing came up and stabbed her in the heart. Her hands went to her stomach, where she was sure the wound was, where the cries of the monsters dug deep into her skin. Percy just stood there, the hurricanes in his eyes swirling with a vengeance, staring at the harpies as they cried for death. 

It wasn't until Annabeth looked at him with tears in her eyes and a broken " _Percy_ ," that he let them die. 

They didn't tell the others about that morning.

* * *

Annabeth started sneaking into Percy's room at night. They'd sit his cot, heads resting against each other. 

He'd tell her about what happened, how he fell into the Cocytus. How he thought of her, of their life together. He spoke about Achlys, how he poisoned her so badly she turned into a shadow of herself. How he convinced Bob and Damsaen to help him at the heart of Tarturas. How he didn't want to die. 

Annabeth would be terrified and scared of the boy next to her when he spoke. But the way that his head was nestled between her shoulder and neck, and how he clasped her hand as if he was afraid she would leave made the guilt curl around her heart and stay there. 

So she would sit and listen quietly, trying desperately to understand the boy next to her. To find pieces that she remembered and attach them to the boy in front of her. They would get through this, together.

Percy would slowly fall asleep, drool collected at the corner of his mouth. And Annabeth would just get an overwhelming feeling of _love_ for the sleeping boy in front of her. She would press a kiss to his hair and then wet it with her own tears.

* * *

Annabeth fell, the wound on her leg bleeding red, it bubbling to gold as it hit the dirt. Before she rose to go back to her mother, to go back to help with the fight, she caught sight of Percy. He and Poseidon were fighting Thoon. 

Percy turned towards her, she saw him - her Percy - for a moment in the madness. But it was gone in an instant, he raised his sword - pointing at something behind her. Annabeth turned and saw Periboia lumbering towards her. She stood and grabbed her dagger from where it laid a few feet away. 

She was able to dart around Periboia trunk legs even with her cut leg. She grabbed a stray piece of clothing and pulled herself up, grasping at anything and everything that could give her leverage. She climbed the giant like a spider, pulling herself onto Periboia's shoulder. Percy called out again and Annabeth was met with the giant's hand. She was swatted off like a nat. 

Annabeth hit the ground with a _thud_. When her vision cleared, she was met with the sight of Thoon swinging his cleaver towards Percy. Percy rose Riptide to block it, but something happened and it flew from his grasp, hitting the dirt. Ares' curse. Annabeth knew immediately. His weapon will fail when he needs it most. Thoon sliced Percy's face. Thankfully, it wasn't deep enough to seriously hurt him, due to Percy's fast reflexes, but Annabeth was able to see his teeth through his cheek when he cried out in pain.

Annabeth let out a scream so close to the one on that cold stone floor, struggling to her feet. 

Thoon hit away Percy like a fly, causing him to crash into the wall and fall with a pitiful _thump._ Her throat closed up when he didn’t move. But the ground began to shake and the sides of the stone walls to crumble. Dust rained down. 

He rose, severely favoring his left, but no less powerful than he was moments before. Despite what the giants had claimed earlier, Percy was creating an extremely large earthquake right where Gaea was to be sacrificed to. 

He glared at Thoon, his hurricane eyes becoming reality. The cut on his face missed his eye by a centimeter, sliding up his forehead before meeting his hairline. His teeth were gleaming, seen through the hole in his cheek. Blood dripped down his face and fell from his chin. The giant fell, the added weight of a falling giant only amplifying the already terrifying earthquake. 

“The Earth goddess it awake!” Eurymedon cried out. Percy gently touched his cut, the pain probably setting in. When he realized what had happened, his rage only grew.

Annabeth grabbed at the dirt, digging her hands into the mud underneath to stop herself from rolling around. Poetic really, clinging onto the very thing she was fighting against while trying to protect herself from the person she loved most. 

All around, the giants were falling and failing about, but Percy was still focused on Thoon. With a yell of rage, he held up his hand as if grabbing something from the air, and then threw it down. Thoon let out a scream of agony, dust and ichor pouring from his ears, nose, mouth, eyes. The giant cried out in pain.

The sight was too similar to the morning on the deck, so Annabeth turned away. When Periboia was finally only dust before her, she looked over.

Poseidon was standing over the dust where Thoon previously laid. He looked up to his son and even though Annabeth couldn’t hear what he was saying, his expression was one of heartbreak. 

Annabeth knew that expression. She saw it every time she looked at her reflection.

* * *

When the battle was over and the gods and demigods were gathered, Percy was left alone. His gaze was on the wall behind them. Piper silently handed him some ambrosia that he chewed quietly. But Annabeth saw the way his jaw clenched, it didn't taste like his mother's cookies anymore. 

His wound slowly healed, his skin melding together before their very eyes, but it still glimmered pink in the light. Dried blood surrounded it. 

His aura had changed too, soured. Couch Hedge would look at Percy and then look away. His father just stared with a sad expression. 

Zeus was the only one who met his gaze. His eyes holding flashing lightning. It was obvious he wanted Percy killed, but when Percy finally met Zeus’ gaze, Zeus looked away.

* * *

It didn't happen for a while. But one day, after Gaea's demise, Annabeth woke up and she _knew_. 

Percy had left.

She didn’t blame him. But she knew, she knew deep in her heart that when he returned they will be on opposite sides. The moments between the madness have faded, becoming shorter and shorter with each day. The day they met again, the insane would have clawed into his skin and clung there. And he would accept it, let it burrow deep in her skin and mind. An itch started at the back of her mind, whisperings of a situation that went this exact way - years earlier. She just didn't know if it would end the same way. 

She didn't know if he would show up with gold or hurricane eyes. She didn't know which one she would prefer. 

* * *

She did not see him for a long time, but her memories of him never faded. Her gaze would wander suddenly and without warning when a memory from the deep abyss of her mind came forward. Those memories were terrible because whenever she thought of him, she thought of what he had become. She thought of the yell of rage and the earthquake. She thought of that morning on the deck.

Others started to leave her alone, seeing that she staring off into nothing more often than not. It was worst than when Hera stole him all those months ago because Annabeth knew that she could find him then. If Annabeth went off and searched for Percy, she would never find him. Not even if she scoured the earth for the rest of her life. And that made her blink away the tears from her eyes.

But when she was alone at night, sitting on his bunk in the Poseidon cabin, she would call forward the sweet ones. The ones from before he was taken. Before each thought was lined with sadness. She would cradle the sweet memories in her hands, refusing to cry in case she tainted them. 

She’d only relive them in the confines of his cabin when she could look around and see things exactly how he left them. When she could look under his bunk and see old coke cans. When she could open his drawers and rock back t-shirts would be staring up at her. The fountain’s constant bubbling. 

Sometimes she would fall asleep, her nose pressed against his pillow. Sea salt and lemon. Him and her.

She once passed the Hypnos cabin and thought about wandering inside. Of falling on a bed and never waking up, of reliving the sweet memories until her mind and body withered to nothing. But a breeze moved her hair and the moment had passed.

* * *

They heard whispers, of a new threat on the horizon. And once more - Annabeth _knew._ Despite the ache in her gut telling her that it's not true, that the 12-year-old boy who smiled at her so hopefully before that first capture the flag wouldn't do that. That the boy who whispered comforts to her in the back of that old trunk that smelled of hay with Oreos in his teeth _couldn't_ do that.

But just like before, Annabeth knew.

* * *

Months, maybe even a year later, time was up. She couldn't ignore the whispers any longer. 

There was a battle approaching. Wide eyes and fearful words made up camp as they heard who was leading it. More looked at her with pity, like how the other seven had looked the days and weeks after he fell. 

And then finally, the day came. 

It was bloody and terrible and the entire time she was fighting, there was a phantom ache in her heart. There was an empty space next to her, the air still despite the incessant screams and cries because there was no witty comment to cover them up. No kiss at the beginning. No laughter with at her refute. 

But in the end, she saw him.

* * *

Annabeth loved him. She never stopped loving him. And seeing him for the first time in what felt like forever, almost broke her. He stood in front of her, close enough to touch. She knew that she couldn't run up to him and threaten him. She knew he wouldn't bubble up with laughter when she did it. Those days were gone. 

She stared into his broken eyes, praying for them to return to the original happiness. He still loved her, she knew for sure, because of the way he cried and pleaded. 

"Please, Annabeth," He pleaded. "Come with me." 

Tears leaked from his eyes, the eyes that were still too dark. The eyes that were still shattered beyond repair. His scar on his face was stark white, contrasting deeply with his tanned skin. Ares had given him that scar. 

And at that moment, more than ever before, Annabeth loathed the gods. 

The gods had done this. They had taken the loveable idiot who collapsed on the Big House porch all those years ago and turned him into this _monster_. 

_They_ had done this to him. They ruined his life and hers. 

Annabeth wanted to say: "yes." She wanted to take his hand and go away. To go with him and try to change the world for the better. Because she knew that that's what he thought he was doing. He honestly thought that the gods would destroy them, and he was trying to save them - to save _her_ in his own twisted way. Because that is what the gods did, they took his mind and heart and twisted them into something so unidentifiable that she couldn't see the boy she fell in love with. She couldn't see the boy she would say yes to. When she blinked, she saw golden eyes and a scar so similar to Percy's. 

* * *

Annabeth was 16 again. Luke was on the floor in front of Percy, begging for the dagger. But now it was Percy before her, staring at her with his sad, broken eyes, and white scar, begging for her to come with him. She could kill him. He would let her. Because he still loved her.

And Annabeth did. She thrust the dagger that killed Luke all those years ago into Percy's chest. She killed him with snot and tears running down her face, but she killed him. She couldn’t help but think of the boy she met with the crooked smile and seafoam eyes. She thought of the boy with the bubbly laughter and fierce loyalty. 

She had tried to help him so much, her own pride stopping her from seeing that she couldn't save him. She had lost that chance when he disappeared into nothingness all those months ago. 

* * *

This was the second boy she loved, the second boy she killed. The second boy who laid dying in her arms. And while Percy's eyes cleared for the first time in such a long time, Annabeth sobbed. For she had just seen the boy she fell in love with for the first and last time in a long time. 

She cried and sniffled, wiping her stray tears away from his face. And as he laid dying in her lap, she ran her fingers through his hair. A ghost of a smile appeared on his lips. The blood pooled in her lap, staining her hands, her clothes. Her fingers smeared blood against his cheekbones, his eyelids. Along his scar. 

She wished that he didn't bleed blood but rather sand. That he was just another monster that she killed and that the cracks in her palms were filling up with dust. She wished that he bled rivers. That the Lethe or even the Styx was running through his veins. That the liquid that was pooling around them would take away her memories, would burn her into dust herself. 

But the blood was blood, it was human. He was human. It dripped from her blade and Annabeth stared at her blood-stained, distorted reflection before she threw it as hard as she could. 

He never wanted to die, she remembered. He had never wanted to die like a monster.

* * *

With the dead boy in her arms, Annabeth mourned. She mourned for the boy with the gleaming eyes and the warm hugs. She sobbed for the boy she loved. For the little kid, she met when she was 12 with the crooked armor and smile. 

And she thought of Luke. More specifically, his mother. Annabeth used to wonder if May Castellan still burnt the cookies and made the sandwiches even though they molded. Now she had her answer. Yes, May Castellan kept making the sandwiches and the cookies because she believed that one day, her little loveable boy would return home.

Because Annabeth would have never stopped waiting too.

* * *

Slowly, the others came. Bloody and bruised, cuts littering their body and limbs in casts, they came. All cried when seeing the boy in her arms.

Even those who have lost someone.

They mourned the boy they all knew before he was forced into the darkness alone, and afraid. 

Piper sat by Annabeth as they moved the body, not caring that the blood, Percy's blood would be stained to her just like it was to Annabeth. Thalia wiped the tears from Annabeth's cheeks. She pressed her lips against Annabeth's skull. 

Thalia didn't mention how they lost another piece of their family, she didn' have to. 

Hazel sat on the other side of Annabeth, her cinnamon hair barely reaching Annabeth's ear. They didn't care that they didn't know him long, that the man who came to mind when they thought of Percy, was not Percy.

Because the boy with the broken eyes and crazy smile was not Percy. The boy who watched monsters wither in pain before killing them was not Percy.

She wanted to tell everyone that, that Percy wasn't the boy that he died as. 

"I hate them," she cried. "I hate them, I hate them, I hate them."

She didn't care if Mr. D or Chiron heard. She didn't care if Zeus came down at that moment and smitten her on the spot. 

"I hate you!" She screamed to the sky. "You did this! You did this to him!" Tears streamed down her face. 

No one else was talking, everyone just standing around with stained cheeks. Zeus didn't even dare turn the clear day stormy. The gods knew she was speaking the truth. Perhaps they even felt guilty. But guilt didn't Percy back. It didn't change the monster back to the boy with the seafoam eyes. 

And Annabeth sat, surrounded by friends, crying over a dead boy for the second time in her life.

* * *

Every one of the seven that were left came up to her. 

They left her stories, little moments when they first fell in love with Percy. 

Annabeth didn't talk, but she listened. She sat and she listened and she cried.

But everyone left, one by one, leaving her alone once more.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I cried writing this. 
> 
> Also, does anyone want to tell me why my writing style changes every time I write?? Like??
> 
> This is the second fic I've written where Percy died. This is the third one I've written where Annabeth is left alone.
> 
> God, why do I keep hurting them?


End file.
